An Eight Year Old Boy

A few days ago my grandson told me about something that had happened at school. Now, before I tell you all about it, keep this in mind, he’s 8 years old, he’s very dramatic, and has a great imagination. I suppose that’s true of most kids his age, though. At least I hope it is! It’s a little sad that we tend to lose those traits over time. But, I digress…He started this story by saying “I have an investigation going, Grandma”. I said “You do? Tell me about it!” and off he went. It seems there was an incident in the boys’ bathroom at school. I’m sure that’s an interesting place, but being a girl, I haven’t experienced that for myself. One of the toilets had apparently overflowed. On its own, this seems innocuous enough. To third grade boys, it’s not! First of all, according to mine, ‘the water was up to our ankles!’. Boys ran screaming from the little kid john! Picturing this? I am! And laughing! He said he went and got the janitor. “He’s new this year, I don’t know him well, but I expect to.” That’s a little scary, to be honest, but we’ll let that go for now.

“Why are you investigating this, G? I’m sure someone just had to poop a lot and it stopped up the toilet. That happens sometimes” I pointed out. “Well, I know, but there was a TON of toilet paper in there! Water was just pouring out! I think someone just stuffed a bunch of it in there to clog it!” He was very sure of that. But who? Who would do this? And why?He had ruled out the kindergarteners and first graders because “they wouldn’t be mean enough yet to do that kind of thing”. He also ruled out the fifth graders because he figured they would be too smart and mature to do it. We had a discussion about that where I gave him my wisdom of having been in fifth grade years ago and having already raised two boys (including Dad) past that age. The fifth graders were put back in as suspects. Grandma knows.We talked about this investigation for about a half an hour. We really got nowhere, of course. I’m pretty sure no one will ever know who perpetrated the crime. Nor does it actually matter in the grand scheme of things. But you know what? I love the fact that this is the type of thing that concerns him at this age. As he gets older, things will get so much weightier. Grandma will be here then, too. We’ll investigate life together.